Converting Products: Coat Weight, Thickness, Moisture

MoistTech has developed the IR3000-C Series online NIR sensor for instant, non- contact measurement of the Converting and Paper Industry in the most demanding manufacturing environments.

Often converting process efficiency is affected by variations in coat weight, inefficient moisture control, thickness and/or temperature issues. MoistTech has been involved in the Converting and Paper Industry for more than 40 years creating tailored customer solutions that address their concerns. The 3000C Series provides continuous, reliable readings and is a one-time calibration, maintenance free, drift free optical design allowing for immediate process adjustments based on real-time measurements.

The IR3000C Series uses state-of-the-art components allowing installation in the most extreme locations. As result of MoistTech’s advanced digital processing, only the IR3000C Series provides true data for all of your converting applications.

Paper and Board

All paper contains some moisture since it is composed of cellulose fibers. This normal moisture content will generally range between 2% and 10% depending on the type of paper, its past moisture history and the atmospheric conditions to which it is exposed. When subjected to extreme conditions the moisture content of a paper may range from as low as 0.5% to as high as 13%. Many basic properties of paper are greatly affected by its moisture content. Paper dimensions, flatness, conductivity, strength and fold are among the more significant properties influenced by its moisture content. These paper properties can be very critical to the proper performance of paper and therefore, effective control of paper moisture level and moisture uniformity is essential for efficient printing and converting operations.

Textile coating & nonwovens

The MoistTech principle of Infrared absorption measures Polymer and Moisture in geotextile lines, diaper components, filter media, household wipes and many other nonwovens. MoistTech manufactures a quality control system tailored for your specific application, for your specific measurement and control needs. Fixed, single-sided sensor are available measuring tandem coatings, basis weight, moisture and thickness.

Coating/Laminating/Converting/Film/Polymer/Label

Online coating and online converting measurement is a key component in the process. Allow MoistTech to help your measuring basis weight on coated board, thickness of coatings and films, moisture and coating all on one sensor. A complete range of applications can be measured for moisture, thickness and basis weight of clear, pigmented, extruded products. Edge curl and lay flat issues are also a problem in the label and converting industry. Uneven moisture stratification can cause shrinkage or expansion of cellulose fibers. Curled stock is a problem for printing and packaging. Coatings can also get thinner or thicker at the edges. Our fixed position NIR transmitters greatly help to reduce curl or coating issues and improve process control operation.

During production of corrugated boards, many problems are caused by inaccurate control of moisture, whether by higher (leading to collapse, flute-exposure), lower moisture (leading to board breaking) or different top/bottom moisture (leading to warp). Moisture control is a crucial issue in production and procession of corrugated boards. Too much water-content would cause boards to soften and submit to collapse and flute exposure after being produced. However, not enough water would make them to be crisp and easy to breakdown. Different moisture content in the top side vs bottom side causes warp issues. Therefore, only by strict control of moisture, operators can produce high-quality boards and boxes, but moisture control is a complex process affected by many elements.

Hot Melts / Glues

Hot Melts are commonly Paraffin Wax coatings. Roll Coaters, Die Coaters, extruders, and doctor blade configurations are among the methods of applying hot melt adhesive. Roll coaters offer more flexibility than die application methods. Die Coaters offer more precision across the web and Hot melt applications are very common. Pressure sensitive adhesives are a unique form of adhesive that are permanently tacky at room temperature. They adhere to substrates under pressure via polar attractive forces rather than forming chemical bonds. There are three distinct ways of applying PSAs: In solvent, As hot melt and Emulsion based.

Typical installations

The MoistTech 3000 series sensors can be installed in many configurations using the bracket on the back or top of the sensor enclosure. Most typical installations are mounted 4” – 16” from to product flow to be measured. Changes in product flow can be compensated for using our filtering, damping and averaging.

After coating station applying water based coatings, either on paper or film

Moisture profile measurement and correction e.g. before steam profilers, before and after water jet micro sprays, before and after segmented infrared drying

MoistTech PC Software

MoistTech has designed a suite of high-tech Windows™ programs to provide user-friendly interfaces for configuration, data logging and monitoring of diagnostics. Our configuration software supplies the operator with the capability to monitor up to three constituents and the addition of the temperature option. Output trending is displayed to take corrective action prior to reaching determined thresholds. With this you can perform calibrations, define gauge and measurement parameters and set-up and configure up to 50 different product codes. The MoistTech Software package is easy to use and compatible with any PC platform.